DEATH OF A MOTH:I was introduced to another story featuring a moth, Virginia Woolf's essay, Death of a Moth In it, Woolf writes about a moth flying about a window pane, its world constrained by the boundaries of the wood holding the glass. The moth flew, first from one side, to the other, and then back as the rest of life continued ignorant of its movements. At first indifferent, Woolf was eventually moved to pity of the moth:The possibilities of pleasure seemed that morning so enormous and so various that to have only a moth's part in life, and a day moth's at that, appeared a hard fate, and his zest in enjoying his meagre opportunities to the full, pathetic. Eventually the moth settles on the window sill and Woolf forgets it until she notices it trying to move again, but this time its movements are slow and awkward. It attempts to fly but fails, and falls back down to the sill, landing on its back, tiny feet clawing at the air as it tries to right itself. The author reaches out to help when she realizes that it is dying and draws back, reluctant to interfere with this natural process. Somehow in the brightness of the day, the power of death was seeking this moth, and there was nothing anyone could do to stop it. Still she watched the moth as it fought against the inevitable:One could only watch the extraordinary efforts made by those tiny legs against an oncoming doom which could, had it chosen, have submerged an entire city, not merely a city, but masses of human beings; nothing, I knew, had any chance against death. Nevertheless after a pause of exhaustion the legs fluttered again. It was superb this last protest, and so frantic that he succeeded at last in righting himself. One's sympathies, of course, were all on the side of life. However, after the moth had righted itself, death descended and it stopped moving in the instant of its victory:The moth having righted himself now lay most decentlanduncomplaininglycomposed. O yes, he seemed to say, death is stronger than I am. In Woolf's essay, the battle between life and death is somehow seen as both pathetic and noble. Pathetic because death will always win regardless the desire for life; but noble in how one faces death - on our back, defeated, or on our feet, and in dignityWoolf's moth, with its quiet dignity and brave fight against deathWoolf's moth leads one to accept death, to embrace the nobility of death
